Either Potomac Nationals (High Class A; Carolina League) owner Art Silber is the most patient man on the face of the earth or he really, really loves Prince William County, as a decision about a new ballpark is delayed once again.
Silber has been working for years on a replacement for Pfitzer Stadium: it’s pretty amazing that he and the Washington Nationals have put up with what everyone considered to be a subpar facility for so long. Along the way, he’s spurned offers to sell the team or move it to a different area, all in the interest of keeping the team in the D.C. suburbs. Financially, it makes sense for him to keep territorial control of a area that boasts some pretty good demographics and is still growing.
But boy — the price he’s paid over the years. Though many expected an announcement in recent weeks about a new-ballpark site, it now looks like we’ll need to wait until spring before the Prince William County Board of Supervisors is ready to go public. The issue: the county wants to build a parking garage as part of a new-ballpark project (which indicates the ballpark site is next to a freeway) and hasn’t yet acquired all the land needed for a development site. Until negotiations are complete and the county works out a financial plan to actually build the parking garage and ballpark, you probably won’t see an announcement of the development site.
RELATED STORIES: P-Nats expand ballpark search area; Pfitzner Stadium field to be upgraded; As Harper skips Potomac, Silber works on ballpark solution; P-Nats, Prince William County working on new ballpark plan
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